In 2019, Navy veteran and Master-in-Arms Erin Kelly found herself homeless after fleeing domestic violence. Two years later, seeking help to get back on her feet, she found herself at Paul’s House, a shelter for homeless veterans just north of the Lehigh Valley.

At first, she was so scared and distrustful of others due to her trauma that, rather than stay in her assigned room at the house, she slept at night in a kennel with her dogs on the property. But over the years, as she spent time getting to know her fellow residents and undergoing peer mentorship programs, she formed what she jokingly called a “found dysfunctional family” among the fellow veterans in the program, which is run by the nonprofit Valor Clinic Foundation.

“It took a while, but I got comfortable, and began trusting everyone that was here,” Kelly said.

Now, Kelly has her own permanent place to call home, and is employed as the “house manager” at Paul’s House, overseeing day-to-day operations at the shelter in the former Hotel Jonas in Polk Township, Monroe County. She is also a peer mentor for Valor Clinic’s Unstoppable program, which helps veterans integrate into civilian society, of which she is a graduate.

She said what makes Valor Clinic special is it’s run by veterans for veterans, who understand each others’ situations more than any civilian could.

Often, she said, veterans who seek services at places that do not cater to them specifically cannot get their specific mental health and behavioral needs addressed. Even services provided via the federal Department of Veterans Affairs employ civilian doctors or caseworkers who she said are not always understanding.

“When you are looking at mental health or behavioral health issues, you have got this chart, or graph of what qualifies somebody as being or having a condition, right?” Kelly said. “When you take a civilian and with the same symptoms and compare them one to one with a veteran, or a military personnel, or even first responders, our norms are off their charts already. Whether it is dealing with hyperawareness, or imagine waking up every morning, voluntarily, being shot at and in fear for your life for over a year. Your situational awareness is beyond what anybody else has experienced. So how can you place me in that box with them, when I don’t fit there? And I’m not crazy just because I’m off of your chart.”

Everywhere in Paul’s House is a reminder of its residents’ military service — American flags adorn the walls, uniforms hang on coat hooks, and red-white-and-blue quilts decorate the otherwise unassuming basement laundry room.

Paul’s House has 12 rooms for veterans escaping homelessness. Eligible veterans can’t have received a dishonorable discharge, have a felony on their record, or be in active addiction due to the property’s zoning, Baylis said. It has transformed the 130 people who walked through Paul’s House’s doors over its 11 years of operation, he attested. Only five of its current and former residents became homeless again after staying at the shelter.

In addition to operating the shelter and peer mentoring programs, Valor Clinic Foundation volunteers do outreach at homeless encampments throughout eastern Pennsylvania and western New Jersey, including the Lehigh Valley, providing hygiene supplies, clothing and other survival-related items to people living on the streets.

Most supplies are provided to anybody, civilians included, but volunteers do so with the intention of finding homeless veterans and getting them off of the streets, Valor Clinic Foundation founder and veteran Mark Baylis said.

“We go into the community where the homeless live and set up and give basic needs for free to all the homeless, as a means to get the homeless vets in and meet them, and figure out how to get them off the street,” Baylis said.

Baylis said it is frustrating to see encampments bulldozed — especially when it makes homeless veterans harder to reach.

Last week, Allentown swept a homeless encampment along the Jordan Creek, leaving several dozen people without a place to go. City officials said the camp needed to be evacuated because it is in a flood zone, but the evacuation sparked outrage among homeless people and advocates who said the city should not force people to leave without giving them somewhere else to stay.

Other encampments in the general area have also seen sweeps, including one in Lehighton in July, according to the Times News.

“You have no idea how frustrating it is to walk into a homeless camp and see the R4 tires from the township’s heavy equipment, and when you’re walking in and you start seeing it, there’s a very distinctive set of tires,” Baylis said. “You see on the way in and you go, oh, no, and you know what you are going to see … they just scoop everything up, throw it in dumpsters. How would you like it if somebody comes to your house, scoops up everything you own, throws it in a dumpster?”

However, Paul’s House is a testament to peoples’ ability to overcome the challenges of homelessness, mental illness and other issues that veterans reintegrating into civilian society can face, Baylis said. The foundation served more than 3,700 veterans in 2024 through its various programs.

The organization relies almost entirely on private donations and needs help to continue providing those services, he added. The Valor Clinic Foundation’s annual Patriots Gala still needs to sell tickets and sponsorships, and Baylis asked the public to consider buying a ticket or donating to the organization online.

Kelly had a message to any veterans struggling with homelessness: You are not alone.

“The most important part, for me, became the peer, the bond, the relationships that are formed here, and that you’re not forgotten by everybody,” Kelly said. Your family may have turned their back on you. You may — your children don’t speak to you or you don’t have anybody left alive. But I do what I do to make sure that there is somebody — when the civilian mentality, the facilities, doctors, organizations, they don’t understand, and we do. We’ve all been in the same place. We don’t judge you because of something that you’ve been through.”

Reporter Lindsay Weber can be reached at Liweber@mcall.com.

https://www.mcall.com/2025/10/08/pauls-house-homeless-veterans-shelter/